Suicide Bombers and Mass Shooters: Different Symptoms, Same Disease

Originally posted by galadofwarthethird
Well judging from your taste in music, books and just random stuff on this site of yours I ran into. I just sort of you know assumed you were somewhere around from the 60ish 50ish era probably around my grandmas age and probably needed a cane to get around with....My bad, sry see what assumptions lead to. That and I just am not a very good listener. I suppose I mustn't egg on my elders.

Originally posted by galadofwarthethird
Oh you would be surprised what ghosts are just hiding around from way back when somebody transgressed on somebody else and it's just bidding its time to do likewise, a lot of that stuff not only transgresses human whims and believes, but it also transgresses space and time. It to is energy focused on its intent. But as you know its not that any one thing is natural its more along the lines that any thing can be considered natural. Maybe looking at things like that is the wrong way to look at them because humans like all other animals can become accustomed to anything if it is so pressed or conditioned, over time anything can be considered natural. Which I think is what you were getting at to begin with. We have not been conditioned to what is not natural, we have been conditioned to what is not all that good for us. Even if at some point in time it was, that point seems to have long since passed and it did not inform us of its passing.

You are completely right, it is all conditioning and you are also spot on about the 'natural' thing. I stand thoroughly corrected. Not sure where that leaves us, but indeed, poor listener you may be, but you talk good

reply to post by KilgoreTrout

I try my hardest to be a poor listener because I do not think any of this will ultimately matter to me, but sometimes I don't succeed, so I end up listening... Carry on stranger.

I think you're right on the money about the newest wave of mass murdering young men.
I also agree with your ideas to fix the problem.
These are young men with no sense of empowerment and they will get it in one way or another.
The warrior culture is pushed here in the US both through current socio-political needs and by gaming and media culture - violent, action heroes, war games etc.
But these are young men determined to stand apart and demand special treatment - including death by police fire if necessary. If only that drive could be harnessed productively. Society loses both the victims and the attacker when they break.

Nice job Eidolon23.

reply to post by Asktheanimals


Thanks, ATA.



I ended up filling it out a little more in my blog. I'll go ahead and just pull the additional content.

Finally, and most importantly, this group displays a sense of wounded entitlement. This is important because of the way we experience shame in our society, and the proliferation of triggers for shame brought about by the gap between expectation and fulfillment in our culture. Sylvan Tomkin, a psychiatrist who specialized in affect, developed a system that takes the form of a compass, illustrating four primary responses to shame: Withdrawal, Attack Self, Avoidance, and Attack Other.

Building on Tomkin’s foundation, Dr. Donald Nathanson delivered a report in 2000 on shame and violence in America. He asserts that although we appear to be a shameless society, that in fact, it remains very much a motive force in our collective psyche.

We veered away from the Withdrawal/Attack Self poles in our sanctioned response to shame in the sixties, and are now fully riveted to the Avoidance/Attack Other poles. Of particular concern is his observation that Attack Other behavior is culturally learned, and that our daily intake of media is saturated with examples: “The real danger is not so much that people… can study and learn the techniques demonstrated in filmic violence, but that such violence… is now taught as a normal and healthy and optimal response to any episode of shame.“

Military psychiatrist Dave Grossman shares Nathanson’s reservations around the cavalier depiction of killing in the media. He goes further, however, and demonstrates that the operant conditioning through which the Army decreased the percentage of non-firers from 50% to 10% during the Vietnam war is virtually identical to what gamers experience playing games that realistically simulate combat. Namely, they entail the use of targets that are as close a simulacra to humans as possible, offer immediate feedback and result in desensitization to violence.

Another overlap: mass killers often use FPS games to practice. They are not just becoming better marksmen: they are practicing a state of mind.

While not every kid who plays Call of Duty and watches torture porn will grow up to become a killer, and only a very tiny percentage of those who match the profile of a mass killer will actually commit murder, that bloody sliver will surely widen as the factors that trigger shame, such as poverty, social isolation, and injustice become more pronounced and collide with society’s implicit endorsement of the use of violence as an appropriate response to it.

hyperboholic.wordpress.com...

reply to post by Eidolon23


A very good summation of the present state of affairs. I might add families without fathers, with no roll model on how to be a man. The only example to draw on being "Grand theft auto"...it wont get better. Dysfunction is normal now so what can we expect.

reply to post by anonentity


Absolutely.

Absentee fathers are a huge factor: it's not just that you don't have an example to model, it's the impact to self-worth, as well as knowing on some level that you aren't getting something every child deserves.

Eidolon23
reply to post by anonentity

 

Absolutely.

Absentee fathers are a huge factor: it's not just that you don't have an example to model, it's the impact to self-worth, as well as knowing on some level that you aren't getting something every child deserves.

Add to that the anger of being deserted. I know because when my wife and I separated I had to move to stay working and my sons felt abandoned. It took years to work through those feelings and they were very, very strong. We are close again I'm happy to say but the potential was there for something extremely negative to be acted out.